Individuals bring their choices to campus — and should be able to smoke in their vehicles

Individuals bring their choices to campus — and should be able to smoke in their vehicles

Washtenaw Community College’s student and employee smoking policies (see story Page 1) have honest intentions, but they are overly optimistic and leave no options for those who do smoke on campus. “As a college, we are in the business of trying to encourage people to be intelligent about their health, about preparing for work,” said WCC President Larry Whitworth. “We’re trying to encourage people to do the right things for the right reasons. Nobody should be smoking – it’s just stupid. “For people to continue to do it just doesn’t make a lick of sense. However, we know that people have their habits. . . . We’re trying to do them a favor and they may not see it, but eventually we will see some changes in behavior and hopefully they will quit smoking.” The college administration seems to assume the smoking policies will force students and employees to quit smoking, but people make their own lifestyle choices outside campus and, inevitably, bring those choices to campus too. There should be options for campus smokers. Some Campus Safety and Security officers, who enforce the student smoking policy, allow students to smoke in their vehicles – and will tell students lighting up by buildings to go to their cars rather than get a violation ticket. But other security officers do no such thing, giving students who smoke no real place to light up on campus. Realistic? No. So students are left to sneak around or blatantly smoke right outside buildings because there’s no security officer around. The WCC Facilities Maintenance department also doesn’t allow its employees to take a smoking break in personal cars, and that is supposed to apply to college employees in general. “Hourly employees, if they’re not smoking, are not on the job,” said WCC President Larry Whitworth. “If you leave campus for your half-hour lunch break and smoke a cigarette and then rush back, I guess that’s fine, but we don’t want you smoking in vehicles.” Many campus smokers think there should be a place on campus where they can take smoke breaks. Well, personal vehicles are the best option. Cars are away from large congregations of students, so there is little likelihood smokers would bother anyone or expose others to secondhand smoke, and it certainly would not pollute campus buildings. Smokers who work and take classes at WCC will smoke on campus. The question is whether it will be in community spaces or isolated vehicles. Decry all options and the best option is the most convenient one.